CS 6006: Succeeding in the Graduate Environment

Cornell CS
Fall 2026

Essentials

Instructor

Anshuman Mohan · amohanⓐcs.cornell.edu

When and where

Mondays, 12:20pm - 1:10pm
Ithaca: CIS 350
New York: Bloomberg 397

Food

Ithaca: we will serve lunch at 11:50am. You are encouraged to come and eat with your cohort. We will keep food service to a minimum during the actual talk, which will start promptly at 12:20pm.

New York: you will get your lunch from the cafe at Bloomberg.

Open sessions

Some of our sessions are open to the wider Cornell community over Zoom. They are marked below. First-year students: please come in person to your room as usual. Everyone else: please come to this Zoom room.

Office Hours

Thursdays, 2-3pm · Gates 339 and on Zoom

Credits and grading

One credit; available with an S/U option only

Resources

Resources you may find useful all semester

Suggested readings

Readings on the graduate experience in engineering fields

Past editions

Archive of previous offerings of CS 6006




Schedule

August 24

Your Health, Wellness, and Finances
Anshuman Mohan

August 31

Senior-Grad AMA
Student panel: Rebecca Hicke, Anmol Kabra, Trifosa Simamora, and Arundhati Singh

September 14

Setting and Managing Expectations
Bharath Hariharan and Alexandra Silva

September 21

Applying for Fellowships
Éva Tardos

September 28

How to Give a Talk
David Bindel

October 5

Writing a Paper
Anil Damle

October 19

Mentorship, Undergraduates, and Outreach
Adrian Sampson

October 26

Deciding Your Thesis Topic
Jennifer Sun

Tuesday, November 3

Law, AI, and the Technologist's Responsibility Open
James Grimmelmann

November 9

The Researcher's Role in the Age of LLMs Open
Jon Kleinberg

November 16

Surviving Rejections Open
Rachee Singh

November 23

Building a Support Network
Student panel; panelists to be announced

November 30

Possible Careers with a PhD
Careers panel; panelists to be announced

December 7

Bobby's Very Colorful PhD Open
Robert Kleinberg